


Fighting Words

by mountainsbeyondmountains



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: "oh yeah they've been banging since castle black", Angst, F/M, Pillow Talk, if the s7 finale was just like, never gonna happen but that's why this exists lol, sansa is scheming, season 7 episode 1 speculation, you know what would be totally rad?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-20
Updated: 2017-07-20
Packaged: 2018-12-04 12:45:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11555484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mountainsbeyondmountains/pseuds/mountainsbeyondmountains
Summary: "I don't need Valyrian steel to bring the King in the North to his knees."





	Fighting Words

Petyr once told her that the moment a man is weakest is after he spends. At the time, Sansa had contemplated this vulnerability earnestly, wondering if perhaps the best way to guarantee a demise to the upjumped brothel-keeper's incessant intrigues was to simply go to bed with him and take it from there. But then circumstances changed, and besides, his too-long-lingering caresses and nauseating breath were already too much to bear. It wasn't worth it. Nothing was. 

Sansa will put this knowledge to a far more compelling use. And strangely enough, it was Jon himself who gave her the idea.

It was when he noted her  _admiration_ of Cersei, of all things. Initially, it wounded her. More severely than she'd ever admit. The thought that she might share commonalities with the woman who belittled and betrayed her was abhorrent. It wasn't fair. But then again, she hadn't been fair to him either. And her reply hadn't been a lie. She  _had_ learned things from the Lannister woman, things that had helped keep her alive to this point, and one of those pieces of advice had came to her:  _Tears aren't a woman's only weapon. The best one's between your legs._

The contrasts between Jon and all the other men she's encountered are most apparent when she lies with him: he's attentive and sweet and gentle and giving in all the right measures, and Sansa doesn't mind in the slightest waiting for the end. It's after, when her leg is hitched across him, her length is pressed along the angles of his thigh and hip and ribs, when her head rests so she can feel the pulse of his throat, and he's bestowing kisses on the crown of her head that Sansa asks Jon, "Did you mean what you said earlier?"

"That you're the most beautiful woman in the world? Yes, I did mean it."

"No. Earlier." Sansa twists her head so that she is looking straight at him. His gaze shifts away, but not before she sees a simmering of frustration in his eyes. 

"Sansa, enough about the bloody Umber and Karstark castles, my mind is made up!"

"No, not that. Earlier."

"When I... wished you good morning?" 

And those words are so dear that Sansa simply has to adorn his neck with a bruise of affection, even though he protests, laughs that he won't be able to take off his breastplate tomorrow for fear the lords will notice the mark. "Not quite so early. At the beginning of the council. You said even the girls will train to fight."

"Aye."

"And what were you envisioning  _me_ training with? A sword? A bow and arrow?" Her tone would be lighthearted if it weren't for the sharp thin edge of iron to it. 

"Sansa, don't fight with me on this."

"I just don't think this proposition of yours is practical. Some souls aren't suited for war, and it would be a waste of their natural talents bestowed by the gods to force them to become mere battle fodder. Besides, what will all this before if you return victorious to a ruined north? Someone needs to bind up wounds and tend the glass gardens and raise the children and keep the fires burning- and  _don't_ just say it's a woman's task. Some women are spearwives, but some aren't. Some men are warriors. Some aren't."

"You would be a fierce spearwife," Jon murmurs. Sansa wishes she didn't wonder if he was picturing his long dead wildling lover in her place. She has faith in him, she really does, but she's been a ghost made flesh too many times. 

"Jon, are you  _listening_ to me?" 

"Of course. I'm always listening to you." There's a hint of weariness there. "I'll consider what you're saying. There's some wisdom there. But we all need to make sacrifices. Not just for the preservation of the North, but for the preservation of our kind. Westeros. The world."

Sansa is tempted to reply, "Says the man who's never ventured south of Moat Cailin," but she bites the words back and smiles so sweet instead. "I'm just saying not to expect me down in the training yard tomorrow morn. The lady of Winterfell has more different duties than learning how to decapitate someone. And those duties are no less important."

"After all you've been through... Wouldn't you like to know how to defend yourself, Sansa?" And she knows he's only coming from the goodness of his heart, like always. He may speak with exasperation and misunderstanding and even a lukewarm fear but never without love. But by the Warrior, which one of them was the one who rode in to save the other with the knights of the Vale?

"Believe me, Jon, I have other ways to keep myself safe."  _And to get what I want._ She moves a hand down further south. "I don't need Valyrian steel to bring the King in the North to his knees."

**Author's Note:**

> Was I the only one thinking, "Lol there is no way in hell Sansa's about to start swinging around a damn sword" when Jon was doing his spiel?


End file.
